Prohibition's century-old start created a thirst

100 years ago on Jan. 17 the anti-alcohol Volstead Act kicked in

Photo of Kenneth C. Crowe II

TROY – The Volstead Act was in effect for just five minutes on Jan. 17, 1920 when a New Yorker had the “dubious honor of being the first person arrested for violation of prohibition laws,” according to news reports flashed by wire services across the country that day.

Michael Minden, a café owner in Brooklyn, was accused of selling a glass of brandy to a federal revenue agent at 12:05 a.m., according to the United Press and local news stories. He'd eventually pay a $200 fine.

While the 18th amendment to the U.S. Constitution made selling alcohol illegal, it took the Volstead Act to put the legal mechanisms in place to enforce keeping the nation dry. The act opened the Roaring 20s, when drinking illegal alcohol was part of changing American habits and saw the growth of organized crime. There are still lingering hangovers today from laws of that time.

The Capital Region became notorious for local and regional bootleggers who ran speakeasies and brought in rum, whiskey and other illicit beverages in from Canada to quench people's thirst.

“Prohibition failed miserably in Troy,” said Kathy Sheehan, the historian for Troy and Rensselaer County.

The city’s big breweries like Fitzgerald Brothers Brewing Company managed to survive with near beer and other business, until the 21st Amendment repealed prohibition in 1933 and alcoholic drinks were legal again. But it was too late for many of the smaller breweries, Sheehan said.

Over those 13 years, the eyes of some of the authorities would turn away, as bars and taverns continued to operate undercover and were shuttered only when there was an occasional raid. Like Minden in the Brooklyn case, the local operators would pay a fine or sometimes spend a few weeks in jail.

In Saratoga Springs, local bootlegger Louis “Doc” Farone “controlled the southern terminus of the bootleg trail” that ran down from Canada through the Adirondacks to the Spa City, said Greg Veitch, retired Saratoga Springs police chief and author of “As Gangster’s Paradise: Saratoga Springs from Prohibition to Kefauver.”

There are stories of Farone’s gang fighting off Jack “Legs” Diamond and Dutch Schultz to keep them away from Saratoga Springs, Veitch said. The city was important for bootlegging as it was where Route 9, the first paved highway headed south, began, he said.

Diamond would be killed in the early morning hours of Dec. 18, 1931, in Albany, hours after he was acquitted during a kidnapping trial in Troy.

The drinking of outlawed booze was accepted in a city whose main vice was gambling, a traditional  draw for tourists since the early 19th century, Veitch said.

Lake Lonely, near Saratoga Lake, was known for being a spot where whiskey was flown in from Canada, said Jamie Parillo, executive director of the Saratoga Springs History Museum.

Prohibition began as the country was dealing with the disillusionment of World War I, but enjoying a decade of prosperity with a rising stock market and changing social values, said Jack McEneny, a retired Albany historian and state assemblyman.

“It took about a year before people realized it was changed,” McEneny said about the impact of the alcohol ban.

With sipping a drink now a crime, a trip to the neighborhood tavern turned people into scofflaws and changed what happened behind the doors closed to keep the authorities out. Jazz and women, who would not have been allowed in, were now there as the outlawing of drinking created a “magical atmosphere,” McEneny said.  It was a time when organized crime strengthened as criminals moved into profit from people's thirst.

The temperance movement’s success arrived, followed by the anti-immigrant atmosphere and laws of the 1920s, McEneny said, noting the similarity between events then and now.

State law still has remnants of prohibition.

In November, voters in Argyle, Washington County, lifted the century-old ban on the sale of alcohol. Residents approved four propositions that made the town wet again, allowing the purchase of locally sourced and crafted beer, wine and spirits in the municipality. It took six tries before voters lifted the no-sales rule that went into effect with the Volstead Act.

In Albany, Gov. Andrew Cuomo included in his 2020 State of the State message proposals to boost the state’s growing microbrewery industry by rewriting prohibition-era laws to allow alcohol sales in movie theaters and allowing colleges to be licensed to sell the alcoholic beverages their students make when learning how to produce them.

"New York's craft beverage industry is flourishing thanks to eight years of targeted investments and forward-thinking policies that are attracting new businesses and supporting our booming tourism industry,"  Cuomo said in a statement. "This measure will remove outdated Prohibition-era rules that hamper private sector investment, ensure we're training the next generation of workers in a critical industry and give more New Yorkers the opportunity to responsibly enjoy a drink at the movies."